If you enjoy interactive data visualizations, make sure you visit the US Federal IT Dashboard. This site is meant for use by both the public and the staff of federal agencies. The goal is to make it easy to explore how the federal government is spending its IT dollars.

The major components of the dashboard are:

• Performance Dashboard: supports viewing of major IT investments, filterable by agency
• Data Feeds: will let you select data to download or create a "dynamically XML feed"
• Analysis Visualizations: lets you chart and animate any combination of 15 IT spending statistics from 2002 to present

This blurb off the FAQ page gives a great overview of what this site is all about:

"The IT Dashboard provides the public with an online window into the details of Federal information technology investments and provides users with the ability to track the progress of investments over time. The IT Dashboard displays data received from agency reports to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), including general information on over 7,000 Federal IT investments and detailed data for nearly 800 of those investments that agencies classify as "major." The performance data used to track the 800 major IT investments is based on milestone information displayed in agency reports to OMB called "Exhibit 300s." Agency CIOs are responsible for evaluating and updating select data on a monthly basis, which is accomplished through interfaces provided on the website."

Following up on a recent Pew study on wireless Internet use (see: Minorities embrace internet via handheld devices), here is a presentation on Current Mobile Trends in Libraries:

• M Is For Service: Current Mobile Trends in Libraries, by Gerry McKiernan, Science and Technology Librarian, Iowa State University Library. The Handheld Librarian 2009 Virtual Conference. (July 30, 2009) [PowerPoint, 164 slides, 10.6MB]

Gerry summarizes a lot of what we know about trends in use of mobile devices like cell phones for access to the Internet and gives examples of services for cell phones already being offered by arXiv.org, IEEE, PubMed, Project Gutenberg, OPACS, and others. Gerry also examines the Kindle, reference services, and virtual learning.

There is a lot of useful information here. Whether you are already providing mobile services or just thinking about it - or even if you think you are unalterably opposed to the idea - this is worth a look.

Peggy Garvin has a new article that covers the basics of searching for Congressional information in GPO's Federal Digital System (FDsys). Thanks Peggy!

The Government Domain - Congressional Documents on FDsys: the Basics, by Peggy Garvin, LLRX (July 27, 2009).

The Pew Research Center report on wireless internet use has some interesting findings regarding broadband access to the Internet.

• Wireless Internet Use, by John Horrigan, Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project (Jul 22, 2009)
• Pew: minorities embrace internet via handheld devices, By Matthew Lasar, ars technica (July 26, 2009).

  It says that African-Americans access the Internet via handheld devices more often than whites, for whom an online connection is more likely to come from an ISP-connected computer. "This means the digital divide between African Americans and white Americans diminishes when mobile use is taken into account," Pew says.

This is a development that should be of interest to those who design web sites for libraries. If you need a reason to persuade yourself or your management that your site needs a mobile-friendly interface, this is it. OCLC announced a mobile interface this year.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is teaming up with Wikipedia. Jay Walsh, a spokesman for Wikimedia, said, "This is the first time the foundation ever met with folks at the federal government level."

• NIH Staffers Get Into the Wiki World, by Ibby Caputo, Washington Post (July 28, 2009)
• NIH Gets Schooled on Wikipedia, by Gautham Nagesh, NextGov, TechInsider (07/28/09).

NIH is encouraging its scientists and science writers to edit and even initiate Wikipedia articles in their fields. This month, it joined with the Wikimedia Foundation, which publishes the cyber encyclopedia, to host "Wikipedia Academy," a training session on the tools and rules of wiki culture, at NIH headquarters in Bethesda.

Will MicroHoo Raise Eyebrows On The Hill?, Congress Daily, Tech Daily Dose, July 29, 2009.

Under the 10-year agreement, Microsoft will acquire an exclusive license to Yahoo's core search technologies, and Microsoft will have the ability to integrate Yahoo search technologies into its existing Web search platforms. Microsoft's new search engine Bing will be the exclusive algorithmic search and paid search platform for Yahoo sites.

While the companies are trying to pitch this as providing more search engine diversity (for advertisers, not users: "advertisers no longer have to rely on one company that dominates more than 70 percent of all search"), it further reduces the options users have to an open, transparent, accountable method of finding information.

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) "now features two new videos on the site (www.nlrb.gov): 'Introduction to the NLRB Public Website' and 'How to Use CiteNet,' the Agency’s electronic legal research database."

• announcement (pdf)
• Introduction to the NLRB Public Website ("demonstrates how to find published decisions and administrative memoranda, how to ask questions via the website or to speak to a person, as well as how to use E-Gov, the Agency’s on-line services such as E-Docket, E-Filing, online forms, and E-FOIA
  requests."
• How to Use CiteNet (CiteNet is a free public service offered by the Agency to assist labor law professionals and the public with their legal research needs.)

Hat tip to: IWS Documented News Service!

President Obama Nominates David S. Ferriero To Be Archivist of the U.S. (updated), National Coalition for History (July 28, 2009).

On July 28, President Obama announced his intent to nominate David S. Ferriero to the position of Archivist of the United States. Mr. Ferriero currently serves as the Andrew W. Mellon Director of the New York Public Libraries (NYPL). Mr. Ferriero succeeds Professor Allen Weinstein who resigned as Archivist last December.

Neil Williams, head of corporate digital channels at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, in the UK Cabinet Office, has published a 20 page guide to using Twitter that aims to describe "why and how we intend to establish and manage a corporate presence on the microblogging social network Twitter.com."

• Template Twitter strategy for Government Departments

Also see Williams announcement: Template Twitter strategy for Government Departments, by Neil Williams Digital Engagement Blog (21. July 2009), and a comment on The Reg: Gov geek publishes 5000-word Twitter guide, by Joe Fay, The Register, (28th July 2009).

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s resignation announcement earlier this month and the transition of power to Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell gave the Alaska State Library a great chance to preserve this "at risk" content. 

Using Archive-It and the manual "start on demand" feature inside the web application  the Alaska State Library crawled Governor Palin and Lt. Governor Parnell's web sites on the eve of the transition of power and was 
able to capture valuable information that is now offline and no longer accessible.

The Alaska State Library’s Alaska Governor/Lt. Governor Web Sites collection was originally conceived to archive these government websites over time.  Once Sarah Palin left office, the governor’s website changed to reflect Sean Parnell as governor, and the lieutenant governor’s
website changed to reflect Craig Campbell as lieutenant governor. Thus all of the information on former Governor Palin’s website as well as speeches and press releases from Sean Parnell’s time as lieutenant governor are no longer available on the live web. 

The foresight of the staff of the Alaska State Library and the availability of the Archive-It web archiving service made it possible to preserve the final changes to these "at risk" websites before they were taken offline.

GCN's list of "great" .gov web sites this year includes GPO's FDsys.

• Great .Gov Web Sites SPECIAL REPORT: "10 sites that take online government to the next level" by Joab Jackson, Government Computer News (Jul 27, 2009)

Other sites GCN lists include: data.gov, The California Metropolitan Transportation Commission's Transit.511.org, the U.S. State Department, the State of Utah, and Science.gov.

While the description of FDsys in the GCN article has no new information for those who have been following its development for years, its presence in the list is notable and important for at least two reasons. First, it is the only one of the ten that emphasizes permanence and long term access.

Second, it is revealing to see the technologies that GCN lists for each site. Every site on the list is noted for use of technologies that provide good access and rich content. These include the current batch of usual suspects, from Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight, to RSS and Cascading Style sheets; from Wikipedia and Twitter, to Google keyhole Markup Language and ArcGIS. But only FDsys also includes technologies that are specifically designed for long-term preservation and for authenticating content: The Reference Model for an Open Archival Information System, and "Digital signatures."

Now if we could just combine that with digital deposit into FDLP libraries, we'd be able to multiply the technical guarantees of long-term free public access to government information by the number of participating FDLP libraries.

We haven't been posting a lot here on FGI this summer, but it is not for lack of news. Most of us at FGI have just been on the road a lot: going to ALA, doing projects, and visiting family. As we start settling back in we'll start posting more frequently again and catching up with developments in government information.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), those defenders of online free speech, privacy, innovation, and consumer rights, have begun an action to tell Google to protect reader privacy. Please sign the petition and send a clear message to Google CEO Eric Schmidt to protect reader privacy.

You shouldn't be forced to pay for digital books with your privacy. Tell Google it needs to develop a robust privacy policy that gives you at least as much privacy in books online as you have in your neighborhood library or bookstore. Google must:

• Protect your reading records from government and third party fishing expeditions by responding only to properly-issued warrants and court orders, and by letting you know if someone has demanded access to information Google has collected about you.
• Make sure that you can still browse and read anonymously by not forcing you to register or give personal information and by deleting any logging information for all services after a maximum of 30 days.
• Separate data related to Google Book Search from any other information the company collects about you, unless you give it express permission.
• Give you the ability to edit and delete any information collected about you, transfer books from one account to another without tracking, and hide your "bookshelves" or other reading lists from others with access to your computer.
• Keep Google Book Search information private from third parties like credit card processors, book publishers, and advertisers.

And since Google is clearly angling itself as a "library" -- even publishing a "Google librarian newsletter"! -- I would ask all who submit an EFF petition to include the American Library Association's (ALA) Library Bill of Rights and a link to the ALA Intellectual Freedom Manual, which states:

Privacy is essential to the exercise of free speech, free thought, and free association. The courts have established a First Amendment right to receive information in a publicly funded library. Further, the courts have upheld the right to privacy based on the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution. Many states provide guarantees of privacy in their constitutions and statute law. Numerous decisions in case law have defined and extended rights to privacy.

In a library (physical or virtual), the right to privacy is the right to open inquiry without having the subject of one’s interest examined or scrutinized by others. Confidentiality exists when a library is in possession of personally identifiable information about users and keeps that information private on their behalf.

Protecting user privacy and confidentiality has long been an integral part of the mission of libraries. The ALA has affirmed a right to privacy since 1939. Existing ALA policies affirm that confidentiality is crucial to freedom of inquiry. Rights to privacy and confidentiality also are implicit in the Library Bill of Rights’ guarantee of free access to library resources for all users.
--Privacy: an interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights

This e-mail from govdoc-l is being reposted with the permission of Doug Way.

Subject: Depository Concerns in Michigan
From: Doug Way
Reply-To: Discussion of Government Document Issues
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 2009 21:23:12 -0400
Content-Type: text/plain
Parts/Attachments:
Parts/Attachments

Hello everyone,

On behalf of the Government Documents Roundtable of Michigan I wanted to make a posting to inform you of an executive order recently made by Gov. Granholm. This order calls for, among other things, the elimination of the Department of History, Arts and Libraries and for the elimination or transfer of the library's Federal Depository collection. As the state's regional library, this obviously has dramatic implications for the state's depository community and for public access to government
information.

For the complete executive order, please see: http://www.michigan.gov/documents/gov/EO36_285881_7.pdf. For a thorough summary of the executive order and the Michigan Library Association's position (as of last week), please GODORT of MI's Red Tape blog, which is maintained by Jon Harrison
(http://blogpublic.lib.msu.edu/index.php/2009/07/14/governor-granholm-iss...). Jon has been posting different details as they emerge, so if you are interested in following this situation I would encourage you to read the Red Tape blog (http://blogpublic.lib.msu.edu/index.php?blog=5).

Needless to say this is a difficult and challenging time for the library community in Michigan. The governor's executive order and other proposals floating around Lansing impact not only the depository program, but a wide range of library services that the residents of the state take advantage of on a daily basis. Unfortunately, just at the time when the residents of our state need libraries the most they are the ones who will suffer the most as they lose access to information
(government and otherwise).

Regards,
Doug Way
President, GODORT of MI

I'd like to take note of the fact that Governor Granholm is a Democrat. It's important to remember that friends and adversaries of libraries come from across the political spectrum. You can never class one party or group of people as wholly bad and another party/group as wholly good.

We at FGI would welcome discussion of any aspect of the closure/reassignment of the Library of Michigan in this space. A wound to one library is a wound to all.

Data is definitely getting sexy. Jonathan Gray of the Open Knowledge Foundation asks "What features should be included in a catalogue of open government data?" and points to a few other data repositories being built on the state and country level (like my own city of SF's CivicDB!). He also mentions the Sunlight Foundation's plan to build on and expand data.gov with a national data catalog that I had meant to write about a couple of weeks ago (go Sunlight!). So I'm putting this question to you, FGI's faithful readers. I'm sure you'll have a thing or three to add to the list of requirements for open data catalogs.

Here are a few suggestions for those building catalogues for (open) government data based on our experience developing CKAN:

• Make the catalogue itself open!
• Let others download the catalogue data in bulk (not just via an API)
• Include information on how to get the data, and how it can be used
• Make it versioned!

[originally tweeted by @EllnMllr. Go ahead and follow her!]